Communication is the key!

I fell apart when I found out that my daughter was slowly losing the ability to comprehend speech. How would we ever be able to communicate with her? Much of the literature describes children with LKS becoming 'autistic like' because of the inability to communicate. But I also stumbled across other papers and information that suggested that children with LKS can utilise augmentative communication devices and visual communication tools like PECS, and sometimes sign language - Makaton and Auslan.

One of the first things I did was go out and buy a book of signs and started educating myself about Makaton and Auslan. I learnt a dozen or so signs and started using them when talking with Taylor. We also made up several picture cards, so that she could point to a picture to indicate what she wanted.

She quickly responded to this. Her first sign was 'thank you', quickly followed by 'orange', which she would use when she wanted orange juice.

After Taylor was discharged from hospital, I rang around, trying to find a playgroup for deaf children, thinking that if she could interact with deaf peers, she may be able to learn some more signs and find a peer group that she could communicate with.

Taylor has embraced Auslan as a form of communication. I have lost count of the number of words that she can sign. She is also beginning to form signed sentences and is beginning to show an understanding of the grammatical structure of Auslan. Taylor also needs Auslan to fully comprehend instructions and conversations. Her ability to process auditory information is improving, but patchy at best. Auslan has given our daughter a voice.